


Star Trek Online: Sad Borg in Brig

by Archangel_Beth



Series: Borg of Star Trek Online [1]
Category: Star Trek Online
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-04
Updated: 2015-09-04
Packaged: 2018-04-19 00:27:16
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 21
Words: 18,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4725911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Archangel_Beth/pseuds/Archangel_Beth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>By this time, Starfleet is potent enough to take out Borg cubes now and then. Cleanup is generally simple: beam any invading Borg into space. But the U.S.S. <i>Gracie</i>'s Chief of Security sees something different in these drones, and now it's up to one of the ship's counselors to rehabilitate the largest number of rescued Borg to date...</p><p> </p><p>(This fic is based on the Star Trek Online (STO) MMORPG. It contains almost entirely original characters, with a small role by one established STO NPC, towards the end. An acceptable cover may be found at <a href="http://archangelbeth.deviantart.com/art/Sad-Borg-In-Brig-674370356">http://archangelbeth.deviantart.com/art/Sad-Borg-In-Brig-674370356</a> )</p><hr/>
            </blockquote>





	1. "Ready to start beaming 'em off."

"Go, go, go!" Security Chief Rico shouted, shoving people through the door out of Engineering with one hand and readying a grenade with the other. Behind them, five Borg advanced -- slowly, as they usually did, like zombies from an old movie.

From the hallway, another of his security team shouted, "Clear?"

"Almost!" He stooped and grabbed the last engineer -- a Tellarite, and heavy for his size -- who'd tripped and fallen in the doorway. By the time he got the alien up and out, the first pair of Borg were reaching for him, and others were close behind. He dropped the grenade almost at their feet and dove through the door himself, shouting, _"NOW!"_

The explosion licked at Rico briefly, but the door slammed shut behind him and the emergency forcefields went up. He couldn't feel if the jamming pulse had gone off; it should've, once the screens were in place to protect mere humans from getting their brains fried.

"Did we get everyone out?" he asked Smithson as she knelt to beat out a smoldering spot on his leg.

"Everyone. Nobody left behind." She grinned at him.

The ship rocked and shuddered, lights and gravity flickering for a moment. They held their breath, waiting for a second explosion to rip them apart, but nothing. Then the comm came on. "And that's the cube!" the Comm Officer called, the relief in her voice telling the tale of _victory_.

"All _right_ ," Rico said, and slapped his communicator. "Security teams! Have we contained all the invaders? Sound off, beta team!"

The _affirmative_ responses filtered in. "Good work, teams! Have we got anyone at the transporter controls?"

"Negative, Rico," came that reply. "Got a Borg in there. Send me a team to decoy it to one side, so we can shove the forcefields around."

He waved to Smithson and Janiver, and they nodded and ran while he said, "Sending you some people. Hang tight. Teams, if it's safe, keep an eye on the Borg -- we don't want to be caught off-guard if they start assimilating the ship."

After a moment, he tested his legs, found nothing broken, and got the door open so he could look into Engineering through the forcefield.

Two of the Borg were down: the ones his grenade had caught. They hadn't adapted fast enough, apparently. One lay in a puddle of red and black, the remainder of its internals pulped while the metal parts jutted from the mess. The other had been partly protected by the first, Rico supposed, and was "just" horribly burnt, leaking greenish fluids.

One of the three left, the smallest, was kneeling by that one's side, hands moving over its body... urgently. Rico shuddered as the small Borg pulled at things within the injured one, then pushed a hand down inside. _Pulling out the orders?_ he wondered. But no, the small one kept moving its other hand, as if trying to pull skin back together over the wounds. Then it looked up, at another who was walking the perimeter of the forcefields, and Rico saw its mouth move.

He grimaced, and waved at one of the remaining engineers who hadn't needed to get to Sickbay. "Turn on the intercom for Engineering, will you? They're _talking_."

The Tellarite was the one who obeyed, and remained at the wall console for further instructions. Rico turned back.

Now two of the surviving Borg were kneeling beside the fallen one while the last -- formerly Klingon, Rico thought, from the forehead -- prowled and beat awkwardly at the forcefields, like someone who'd forgotten how to throw a punch. A low mutter of monotone Klingon curses came from the intercom. More loudly, though...

_"Do not cease, Eleven,"_ the smallest one was saying, turning its head from peering into the fallen one's midsection with its eyepiece, to address it. To touch its face...

The little one was female. Pointed ears, and the visible half of her face chalky-gray but seeming young. An eye intact behind a HUD eye-screen. Where her hand passed over the other's face, it left behind a glitter of healing nanites.

The fallen one was Vulcan. Male. His left arm had been replaced with a weapon, and lay clumsily beside him.

The other beside him was also female, maybe human, and also trying to spread nanites across his body. "Organic repair requires supplies," she said. "Medical." She stood and turned, going to the console that had been caught inside the forcefields. The 'field should've cut through the connections... And probably had, though it might still have some limited functionality. "Medical," that Borg said again. Then, "Converge. Converge. Report. Converge. Report. One of Thirty, report. Two of Thirty, report."

_Come in, alpha team,_ Rico thought as her count incremented. The orders of someone who'd lost contact.

The other one kept repeating _do not cease_ to her wounded companion, with one hand down where a Vulcan heart would be. Trying to keep it beating?

And now he was trying to see if they were related, wondering if they'd been family or friends or mates before assimilation. Now he was thinking of them as people, not Borg.

On his comm-badge, Janiver said, "We've got the transporter controls back, Chief! Ready to start beaming 'em off on your order."

Rico swallowed. Beyond the screen, not ten feet in front of him, the little Borg said, "Do not cease, Eleven. Do not cease. Twelve, find power. Power for Eleven. Do not cease, Eleven." He could hear the words before the translator got them; she was speaking Vulcan.

Rico said, "Belay the transport."

"Sir?"

"Belay the transport!" He hit the wall beside the door with his fist. "Dammit, I can't beam out a bunch of Borg when one of them's trying to heal her friend and telling him _don't die_."

There was a silence -- but the shields didn't flicker to let transporters pluck out the boarding party.

The next voice from his badge was Captain Tuskany's. "Rico, what's going on?"

"Got four Borg in front of me, sir," he said. "And one's dying, and his... I don't know, they both look Vulcan. She's begging him not to die, all right? Borg don't _do_ that. They don't care about other drones."

Slightly muffled, Tuskany said, "Engineering, on screen."

Another silence, while the littlest Borg asked Twelve -- _in_ Klingon -- for power for the wounded Eleven, which sent the Klingon woman to the console, where the desperate maybe-human Borg there still tried to summon the rest of her fellows like a security officer calling into a dead communicator.

And the little one kept up her desperate, Borg-flat, _"Do not cease,"_ as she tried to put the Vulcan back together, like a doctor or a friend.

"Rico," Captain Tuskany said. "Can the brig hold them?"

"I think the screens can, sir," Rico said. "Or rig something up in the holodeck -- they can't assimilate photonic constructs faster than we could contain them."

"Get the brig prepped. And Sickbay. I don't think she's going to be able to keep that one alive much longer." Before the connection cut, Tuskany said to Comm, "Oshni, you said you thought the jammer signal might be modified to knock Borg out entirely, if we could get them in a small enough space and crank it up enough?"

Rico told the Tellarite engineer, "Stay here, keep an eye on the situation. If they look like they're getting out, tell me." Then he sprinted for Sickbay, using his comm-badge to give the orders for readying the brig for Borg.

***

They got the singleton out of the transporter room first. Then the ones who'd been trying to get to the bridge. Then the four from Engineering. Rico watched the recordings later, after they were secure, while the Vulcan male was in surgery with Sickbay screened and guards around to make sure he didn't turn out to be a nanite bomb to infect everyone with Borgitude.

The recording wasn't at a good angle, but it didn't take a good angle to see how the little Borg reacted when the other two got beamed out. It was pretty obvious when she flung herself against her patient -- friend? family? -- and held on until the transporter's glitter pulled them apart.

And now they had slightly more than half a dozen Borg prisoners, most unconscious in their cells and one being taken apart and put back together by the doctor.

Rico drank his coffee and flipped through the brig camera feeds. Humans. Klingon. One Romulan, he was pretty sure. The little one who looked Vulcan to him.

He sure hoped they could be saved.


	2. "How do you feel?"

Ry'var lashed her tail. It was better than beating her head against the wall. Counselors who beat their heads against the wall tended to get lectures from doctors, later, about concussions. But what was she supposed to do with a collection of _Borg_? All right, the Klingon was easy. Upon regaining consciousness, she'd started destroying her meager surroundings in the brig, and Ry'var had decided that looked like Klingon coping mechanisms and she should be left alone unless she looked like she was trying to assimilate things. And the Romulan seemed chatty enough (for a Borg) about what she'd been trying to do -- get to the bridge to take down defenses, fly the ship where the _Borg_ wanted it, that sort of thing.

But what was she supposed to do with the one who just kept repeating, uncertainly, _"Lower these shields. Prepare for assimilation"_? And when she wasn't doing that, she was trying to get her finger-probes through the forcefields and repeating a roll-call of her group of thirty. By elimination, that one was either Eight or Nine, since she skipped those numbers, and the dead one from Engineering was probably Nine or Eight. The Vulcan in Sickbay was Eleven. The Klingon was Twelve.

Ry'var was frustrated. Even Eight-or-Nine was better than the ones who just sat in their cells. The little Vulcan-looking girl was the worst, since she was still smeared with Eleven's blood from hands to face where she'd held onto him at the last moment. Ry'var had reviewed the logs. She'd been beamed in. Woken up. Gotten up and looked all around the cell. But now she just knelt and stared at her bloody hands when there wasn't any movement to attract her attention.

It was entirely possible that it might help to tell that one her friend was alive. But it might also make them try to re-establish a Collective. Ry'var had agreed: Don't let them see each other. Don't let them know they're not the only ones who made it. Not until they're functioning as individuals again.

Don't let them know Eleven hadn't died.

For the sake of her head, Ry'var prowled down to Sickbay instead and lurked on a stool by the Vulcan's bed. First the doctor'd saved his life, then she'd pulled most of the Borg implants out of him, and just yesterday she'd stuck some cloned replacement organs into him. Next would be his left eye and left arm; the stump was wrapped in packs of Medical Stuff (a highly technical term that counselors did well to respect). But aside from him being strapped down and given occasional infusions of nutrients, he was currently in a natural sleep.

Or maybe not. His eyelid flickered -- the other one still covered by bandages -- and Ry'var swayed, torn between leaning forward and not wanting to be too close if he became Borgish. What if they'd missed a nanite-injection device on him somewhere, like the mouth?

The eye opened. Ry'var said, gently, "How do you feel?"

The eye closed again. He took a deep breath, opened his eye again, and said, "Quiet."

The self-awareness in that word was palpable. Ry'var nearly fell off her stool in relief. "You're safe now. You're on a Starfleet vessel. The doctor says she's got almost all the Borg stuff out of you."

"Ah." He paused long enough, re-closing his eye, to make Ry'var wonder if he was just collecting his thoughts or if he'd fallen asleep again. Then he said, "Setek of the _Donnovan_. I will meditate now."

"I can try to get you a candle," Ry'var offered.

"There is a ceiling. It is sufficient."

The Vulcan _now go away_ was palpable enough that Ry'var merely made an agreeable noise and slipped off to tell the doctor her patient was likely to make a full recovery of his wits.

***


	3. "This unit wishes to fly."

Ten of Thirty _(one, of nothing)_ knelt in the small space and watched the numbers counting down the time to cessation. Sometimes she remembered Eleven's heart against her hand: still, then trembling, damaged, mending as she pumped the blood for it. Stuttering as she tried to repair enough of the links to the lungs and brain to keep him stable enough for his own nanites to replenish their numbers, resume their duties, restore his outer coverings, and circulate oxygen for his organic parts again.

The transporter had taken them away. Apart. What few recordings she had showed that she had arrived in the small room alone. Then something had ripped away awareness. Others had entered the room briefly, removed the communication node, and left her alone.

She was still alone. Sometimes the others stood outside the room's forcefield-warded opening and spoke, but they had said nothing relevant, and she had not responded.

Her eyepiece was rimmed with the color of _alert_ ; she had damped the programming that called for attention, scanning, constant movement and evaluation. It left a circle of color in that side, but it was irrelevant.

The numbers in her other eyepiece counted down. Without power, she would cease, like Nine had when the grenade went off.

Like Eleven.

***

"This unit is Thirteen of Thirty," the Romulan Borg said. She looked... crabby, in a distant, unfocused way. "You are a pilot?"

Theres Th'vath swung his antennae uneasily. Counselor Ry'var made encouraging motions at him, so he said, "Yeah. I'm the conn officer for this ship. I fly the thing, first shift."

"This unit flies ships," she stated. "This unit cannot fly ships _here_."

"Well, _no_ ," Theres pointed out. "That's kind of the point of brigs. Keeps people from stealing the ship!"

"This unit wishes to fly."

"You're gonna _stay_ in there--" he started.

Ry'val interrupted, turning the intercom off. "No, no, this is a good thing! She's stated a _desire_! We need to encourage her!"

"To _steal the ship_?" he demanded.

"To be an _individual_ with desires of her own!"

Theres rubbed his face and swung his antennae in annoyance. "Fine, turn the intercom back on." When she did, he said, "Right, as I was saying. You're gonna stay in there _until_ we know you're not gonna try to fly this ship back to a Borg cube."

The concept was clearly not one that a Borg had an easy time processing. "... _You_ fly this ship."

"I fly it where the captain tells me to. I don't steal it!"

"You fly this ship... you are a pilot..." Intensely, the Borg said, "This unit wants to be a pilot like you."

"Does that include the drinking and bar brawls?" he asked, mentally considering his service record.

Thirteen of Thirty paused, then said, "...yes?"

Theres found his antennae twitching in amusement. "All right, maybe we'll get along after all."

***

The link to the Collective was down. Fourteen didn't like that, but there wasn't anything she could do about it.

She was imprisoned. She saw no vulnerabilities in the defenses.

Either they would continue to provide power, or they would not. Either the Collective would retrieve her, or it would not. Either she would be kept in the room, or she would be moved elsewhere.

She listened to what they said, analyzed it for relevance, and thus far had found nothing worth responding to.

***

Setek, who had been Eleven of Thirty for some years, eventually condescended to provide designators for the rest of the captured Borg. This pleased Ry'var, since "the one who assimilated her bunk mattress" and "the one with blood on her" were not encouraging designations -- and she needed as much encouragement with this job as she could get.

(It had required some thought before they'd decided it was worth telling Setek that there were still others of that group alive. But he hadn't evidenced any sign he wanted to return to the Collective, so they'd taken the chance. It also kept Ry'var from going and getting drunk with Theres.)

Eight of Thirty was the one who spent her conscious moments prodding for weak spots in the forcefields, muttering a roll-call to the rest of the Thirty. She was also the one who had made a try of turning her bunk mattress into a recharging unit, with the provided battery -- the very _small_ provided battery -- nestled into a niche within. The result was both creepy and oddly pathetic, and the human Borg had to sit against it instead of stand as Borg usually did.

Ten of Thirty was the one who'd been trying to save Setek's life, and who now sat in her cell and ignored the battery they'd provided for limited recharging. Ry'var would have despaired if Ten hadn't at least showed signs of tracking movement. She asked if Setek knew who the small Borg had been before, but he hadn't. (Ry'var hoped the memory had just fallen into a Borg-induced hole and Setek might yet recall her.)

Twelve of Thirty was the Klingon. She'd managed to exhaust her power supplies and there'd been a scramble to make sure she was unconscious before someone went to shove the battery against one of the charging ports they'd identified, while still worrying that she might die if they delayed too long.

Thirteen of Thirty was the female Romulan. Aside from Setek, she was the one Ry'var had the most hope for, as she'd begun to regain some vague memories. Imprinting on an Andorian pilot was perhaps not the best thing someone might do, but considering the alternatives that were sitting in their own cells, Ry'var wasn't complaining. _Theres_ was complaining a little, since he was the one whose body-language Thirteen was trying to copy, but Ry'var had glared him into silence on that topic.

Fourteen of Thirty was a human female, who'd been on her way to the bridge with Thirteen, Sixteen, and another Borg who'd been killed by security -- probably Fifteen. She was another one who just sat in her cell, tracking movement if it happened, ignoring attempts to communicate... but at least she'd used the battery.

Sixteen was an Andorian of uncertain gender and few biological parts left. Ry'var was frankly a little afraid of Sixteen, who walked circuits around the cell, striking at the forcefield with both fists. It might be Andorian coping, or it might be Borg determination. Whichever, Sixteen would keep at it until it fell down, and then drag itself to the provided battery to recharge and do it all over again.

***

"One of Thirty, respond," Eight said again. If One had gotten into the ship systems, he would be able to hear her. If any of them had gotten into the ship systems, they would be able to hear her. So she kept speaking when she was not in a recharge cycle, so they would know they were not alone.

She probed at the forcefields, trying to get through them, to link up with... anything. "Two of Thirty, respond."

If One no longer functioned... Eight didn't know if he did. If any of the others, from Two through Seven, still functioned. They had lost contact with that group first, and they had been under heavy fire from the ship's defenders. But then Eight had lost contact with all the others in the room, and only Nine had been entirely dead before that. Whatever had severed the linkages might not have struck them all at once. It might have taken them drone by drone. "Three of Thirty, respond."

Eight was the one who would be in charge, if One through Seven were gone. Eight would have to coordinate the group and provide guidance, till the Collective determined if the Thirty's ranks would be filled again, or if they would be re-numbered. "Four of Thirty, respond."

Eight was alone. "Five of Thirty, respond."

They were not responding. Borg instincts could not admit that they never would. "Six of Thirty, respond."


	4. Simple concept, tricky execution.

Doctor Jones had given a very thorough presentation to the senior crew -- and Ry'var, of course -- about Borg neural modifications. In particular, the electronics in the brains that managed the rest of their systems, and the ones that muted emotional responses. "The degree of fury that Twelve displays is truly a testament to Klingon determination," she'd said, admiringly. "All that is _in spite of_ these 'brain chips' that suppress anything the Collective deems irrelevant."

Now it was time for questions, and Ry'var stood first. "So what are we going to be able to _do_ to help them, if they've got these... these things in their heads constantly reinforcing _Borg_ behaviors?"

The human woman grinned at her. "We take them out, of course."

Ry'var sat down heavily. "It's... that simple?"

"Well, it _is_ brain surgery," the doctor said. "Simple concept, tricky execution. I'm working on, ah, arranging for normalizing their bodies. I can do a lot of that at the same time, you see, and then we only have to knock them out once."

Captain Tuskany said, "How long before you can start?"

"Give me another couple days for, mm, me to brush up on the hormonal balances I'm going to need to re-create. Probably want to do the humans first."

Ry'var suspect that "couple days" was more for the doctor's cloned parts to mature. Doctor Jones was, perhaps, a little too fond of researching things that no one really wanted to play with anymore: cloning, genetic manipulation, all the little things that tended to go terribly, horribly wrong when people tried to get too clever.

So far, their doctor hadn't tried to get _too_ clever, and had once managed to keep the crew from being artificially devolved by a forgotten civilization's contagious bio-virus. She had also somehow managed to scream at the away team enough that the _next_ contagious bio-virus they found was properly contained and scanned before anyone handled it, and hadn't gotten loose at all.

Admittedly, what she'd screamed was that if they did it again, they'd have rat tails for the rest of their lives if she had to graft them on personally, but everyone had been extremely impressed with the turnaround in bio-security that Doctor Jones had caused.

"After the humans," Security Chief Rico said, "which ones will you do next?"

"Hm." Jones tapped her fingernails on the table. "Medically, the Klingon would probably be the next-easiest, considering I understand the biology fairly well. The Andorian will be the hardest to restore, obviously, and I'm not sure I want to put that one's brain back together while the body is still... well, almost entirely mechanical. Unless Counselor Ry'var thinks it would help Sixteen's sanity?"

Ry'var shook her head. Whatever nightmare the Andorian Borg was in, it probably wouldn't be helped by waking up to find its body was a mass of Borg technology. The behavior-loop was probably more stable.

"And the other Vulcan?" Rico asked. He'd confided to Ry'var that he was worried about her, since she still hadn't plugged herself in to recharge. Scans showed she still had some days of operation left before they had to go in and manually connect her to a power source, but... Ry'var was worried, too.

"I need more scans of that one. She's not related to Setek, and she's not related to Thirteen..."

"Of course not," the first officer said. "Thirteen's a Romulan."

Jones gave him a long look. "Just because Ten of Thirty doesn't have the forehead ridges doesn't mean she's not a Romulan as well, or part-Romulan. The ridging genetics aren't as uniform in their sub-species as they are in, say, Klingons. Remember that her behavior showed _emotion_. That's why we saved them, right?"

Rico sat back and looked unsettled. "You can't tell?"

"Without the genetics for the ridges, it's not always obvious, no." Jones tapped her fingernails on the table again. "I need better scans. Borg nanites can affect genetic sequences, so even if I built a new body for her from scratch -- on the holodeck -- there's no telling if it'd be accurate. Or even viable, without the Borg alterations. Obviously, she doesn't have the common Romulan skull ridging, but I think she also lacks the nictitating membrane most Vulcans have. But on the third hand, her remaining eye has been modified because of the display over it. I'll have to examine her more closely when I start deciding what can be removed and what needs to be kept."

"Maybe she'll start getting her pre-Borg memories back," the first officer said hopefully. "Theres says Thirteen is starting to come up with comments about the ship she was on."

Jones said, "Maybe. And maybe when I start digging around, I'll find some structural evidence to tell me which version of the species Ten leans toward."

Captain Tuskany said, "Ry'var, any input about which ones Doctor Jones should work on first?"

Ry'var considered the various Borg she'd been saddled with, and the state of her own nerves. "Eight first. She interacts with her environment, even if she's doing it like a Borg, so she might recover more quickly. I'd like to suggest moving Twelve up to right after that, because she's very hard on her cell _and_ hard to keep powered up. Maybe if she's less obviously Borg-modified, she'll start to calm down and be able to work through the trauma."

Rico muttered something under his breath. Ry'var said, "Yes, Rico, Ten would be good after that, since she's not recharging on her own, unlike Fourteen and Sixteen. I'm torn about Thirteen, though, because she's having good progress on her own, but to continue that progress, we're going to need to get her out of the brig and I know we don't want her to switch over to 'assimilate, assimilate' mode."

Jones pulled out her padd and made notes. "Eight. Twelve. Let me do Thirteen after that. It will give me more familiarity with a definite Romulan's physiology. Then Ten, Fourteen, and... Well, I'll have to do some research for Sixteen."

That was, Ry'var thought, almost certainly code for "have to figure out how to clone an entire Andorian body and re-attach _everything_ ," which was enough cloning that everyone would be antsy to hear it said out loud, and Captain Tuskany would probably need to have a private conversation with Jones about exactly what the captain could ignore.

Ry'var hoped the captain could ignore a lot. Sixteen was extremely disconcerting, and it was probably going to need a _team_ of counselors to restore it to sanity, even without having a mechanical body...


	5. It was only logical.

Setek knew the crew were testing him. It was only logical. He also knew that in his current condition, there were few places he could be put that were as secure as the bed he was strapped down to, both to keep him from stressing his new organs and to reassure the crew that he would not attempt to assimilate them.

Outwardly, he was almost entirely restored. The lines of his face were subtly different, as the surgeon had not had any records to work from when she removed the eye-pieces and tubing, but he would adapt.

Inwardly... He was still contaminated with nanites, if at a far lower level than before. There were still Borg-created links in his brain that could not be removed, and required nanites to service them, just as his blood brought oxygen to organic cells. And, the doctor had told him quietly, it was entirely possible that his telepathic abilities would never recover.

So he would never be wholly free of the Borg, even if he banished the memories of the dark cube. The Klingon who'd whispered Klingon curses throughout regeneration cycles, to his right. The small kinswoman with her mostly-organic hands to his left, who had once, Setek remembered, had him lift debris off a dying woman, to give her the gift of assimilation.

That memory, of a new mind joined to the Collective, _welcomed_ to it, soothed of its terror even as it was crushed beneath the Collective's will... It was disturbing, and he almost turned his face to the ceiling to meditate and set aside the recollection. (Smooth, white, Starfleet. Nothing like the twisted black and chartreuse of the cube.)

But they were bringing in one of the others now. Female, unconscious... _Eight,_ he recalled, though he did not want to. The memories of the Collective were too vast for one mind to contain them all, but Vulcans rarely forgot anything... He pressed the comm button beneath his hand and said, "Tell the doctor. That one was assimilated early. She will not remember a time she had organic eyes."

Through the force-screens being set up around the surgery area of Sickbay, Setek saw the message relayed. The doctor turned and gave him a thumbs-up gesture.

_Humans,_ he thought, and set himself to meditation.

***

When Eight regained consciousness, she was... disoriented. More disoriented. Things were wrong. Displays had been removed. Functionality had been removed. Her repair functions were not responding. She was unable to stand, or to assimilate the bonds that held her to the surface.

She could whisper, her throat raw from this inefficient form of communication. "One of Thirty, respond. Two of Thirty, respond. Three of Thirty, respond..."

At the third repetition, she hesitated, then said, "Nine of Thirty, respond."

He didn't, of course.

None of them did.

The unfamiliar emotion of _doubt_ was cold in her blood.

She began to anticipate the appearance of the species who had confined her, as a distraction from the emptiness where the Collective had been.


	6. "And how are things doing?"

"And how are things doing, Ry'var?" Captain Tuskany asked.

Ry'var's head ached; going drinking with Theres had been a bad idea, even if the brief excursion with Thirteen of Thirty had gone very well. The celebration drinks, after the Borged Romulan had been returned to her "quarters," had turned into drinks while Ry'var moaned about the others, and Theres had patted her shoulders, then scritched her ears absently, and she'd licked one of his antennae, and she wasn't going to try to piece together what'd happened next. 

Instead, she reported, "We took Thirteen of Thirty to the bar, very briefly, where she emulated Lt. Th'vath's body-language, and we were able to teach her how to drink from a glass. The doctor's modifications to her digestive system -- well, modifications to the replacement digestive system -- seem to be working, though Thirteen seemed to find the experience inefficient. We've promised her a visit to the bridge soon, since she didn't try to assimilate anyone or anything."

Tuskany leaned back, arms folded. "Fair enough. Any more of her memories surfacing?"

Ry'var nodded. "She spontaneously mentioned parents! Setek reported that while he, the Klingon, and the Andorian were assimilated as adults, Ten, Thirteen, and Eight were removed from growth chambers when they were assigned to the boarding-party group -- the 'Thirty,' that is. If Thirteen can remember parents, there's a chance she'll be able to give us enough information to find her colony and return her to relatives."

The captain said, "Depends on whether she's from one of the splinter groups, or one of the ones who're still calling themselves the Star Empire. Wouldn't want to drop her off where she'll be disassembled for her Borg secrets..."

Ry'var winced. "Well, we'll need to find at least two Romulan colonies, then, who'd be willing to take Borg, if Doctor Jones decides Ten isn't Vulcan. Apparently the Borg didn't bother to decide which species she was, either."

"Not one tolerant colony?" Tuskany asked.

"I don't believe that would be wise, sir. Even though some are making breakthroughs and I'm hopeful for the others, there's a chance that the ones who 'grew up' Borg would try to merge back into a miniature Collective if they were aware any of the others were still alive. And if they did that, it wouldn't be surprising if they went on an assimilation spree, or called for the Collective to fetch them."

They both shuddered at that thought. Tuskany said, "I presume Sixteen is still..."

"Doctor Jones and some of the others managed to get into the nanite programming code. I don't really understand the explanations, but they used the partial recharging unit that Eight made out of her mattress, and somehow convinced Sixteen's Borg systems that it was time for an indefinite nap." Which was a relief. An almost entirely mechanical Andorian in repose was creepy, but not nearly so upsetting as that same Borg trying to beat through the forcefields, with blank, charcoal eyes.

"Anyway," Ry'var continued, "Ten's scheduled for her de-Borging surgery tomorrow. Eight's begun talking to me, instead of just calling for the rest of the Thirty all the time, and I believe we're making good progress in the concept of having emotions."

"What happens if our mystery Borg doesn't like having emotions?" Captain Tuskany asked. "What if the doctor's got it wrong?"

Ry'var wrapped her tail around her legs. "I hate to say it, sir... But sending her back with Setek might have the same problems as putting her on the same colony world as Thirteen. Even if _he_ doesn't want to re-create the Collective, we have to remember how focused she was on saving his life. Yes, Vulcan's a big planet, and they could be separated once they got there, but..."

The captain leaned forward, elbows on the table. "You're saying that even if she's pure Vulcan, she's likely to be unstable enough that one slip-up would put her into full Borg mode, trying to get to him?"

"It's just a hunch, Captain. But the thought of putting them together makes me very uneasy. I don't think the Vulcans would appreciate Borg-style help in emotion-control."

"Agreed." Tuskany waved a dismissal. "Get some rest, Ry'var. Your fur's a mess. You're doing heroic work on this and need to take some time for yourself."

Ry'var forced her ears to stay up and not go down in embarrassment about why her fur was a mess. She was sure nothing _too_ inappropriate had happened... They'd mostly had their uniforms still on when they woke up in her quarters, after all. "I'll take some time when we've got them all safely placed with their people, sir."

"Shore leave on Risa for a month, eh?" Tuskany asked, amused, and waved her out before she could dispute the idea.


	7. "This unit has become defective."

"Diagnostics are malfunctioning," Eight of Thirty said, abruptly realizing that they had _been_ malfunctioning for some time, refusing to give errors when she knew there were errors. She had been waiting for the notifications. But they had not come.

Functionality had been lost. Equipment had been removed. Flesh had been put in its place. These should have been alerting her, to go for repairs. Or to go to the place where drone equipment would be reclaimed, and the drone terminated.

The furred unit in front of her, beyond the forcefields, said, "Er?" An irrelevant noise.

"Diagnostics are malfunctioning. This unit has become defective. This unit should be disposed of." And the clutching, tight feeling in her chest was irrelevant.

"You're not damaged!" the furred one said, very quickly.

"Diagnostics are malfunctioning. This unit is defective. This unit is no longer functional. This unit should be disposed of."

"We're trying to fix you!"

Eight processed this information. "This unit awaits repair," she said, and closed the fleshy lids over her optical sensors, ignoring further input.

***

There was movement, outside the forcefields. Ten of Thirty (nothing, of nothing, with the numbers counting down to nothing) flicked her gaze to the movement, as a scout and spotter should.

Four members of species 5618 stood, facing another humanoid. The forcefields interfered with her ability to scan, which meant she could not make a genetic evaluation of the one they looked at, whose back was to her.

The attempt to classify was automatic. Male. Height ruled out several species. Coloration ruled out others. Presence of hair, cut close to the skull, ruled out still others.

He turned his head, and through the blurring of the screen, the curve and point of his ear seemed as familiar to her as the halls of a cube.

There was no need for consideration. She lurched up onto her knees, tipping forward and catching herself on the forcefield's uncomfortable barrier. The sensations were irrelevant.

Communications were still down. She used vocalization instead. "Eleven! Eleven of Thirty! Eleven!"

***

"--going to use Oshni's communications trick to overwhelm her. When she's apparently unconscious, Janiver uses the hypospray of the modified nanites on her, which should keep hers in shock for a while. We cover him, in case of problems. After the hypospray has been administered, we get her strapped onto the stretcher, and we're all beamed to Sickbay. Any questions?" Lt. S'saik said to his crew, with carefully practiced informality. Most Vulcans who chose Security track preferred their fellows to adapt to them; S'saik had experimented with adapting his own behavior, and found it averaged at least 10 percent faster responses from Terran teammates. (It distracted Caitians, wasn't informal enough for many Tellarites, and he was still determining what the long-term effects were with Andorians.)

The group were shaking their heads, then Janiver gave a double-take and pointed to behind S'saik. "Sir!"

S'saik turned.

The previously immobile Borg in the cell, designation Ten of Thirty, was speaking unheard words, its hands pressed against the forcefield and beginning to shift from kneeling to standing. S'saik paced closer to the brig cell, eyebrows quirking at the unexpected behavior, and looked down.

The Borg drone looked up at him. It mouthed one final thing -- _eleven_ , he thought it was, in Vulcan -- and sat back on its heels, bloodstained hands falling to rest atop its thighs again. All interest in them had faded, apparently; its gaze slipped down to an unfocused stare at knee-level.

The only logical conclusion S'saik could form, given the sparse data, was that the drone had mistaken him for its companion, Setek, who had been designated Eleven of Thirty. And once it had realized its mistake, it stopped trying to attract his attention.

Still, he flipped the switch that would allow communication between the cell and the outside, and waited a moment longer before asking, "Did you have something to say?"

The Borg only closed its eye.

"Mm." He turned off the intercom and instructed his team, "Positions, everyone."

The procedure went off extremely well. It would have been flawless, if the tubing on the Borg's head hadn't caught on the edge of the stretcher, causing a delay of three seconds to reposition the unconscious drone properly, but that was well within the safety margin. S'saik approved.

***

Ry'var downed another shot of the against-regulations beverages Theres had brought and put her head down on the low coffee-table in her quarters. "It was going so _well_ with Eight! But now she's waiting to be _fixed_ , and I think she means Borg-style emotion-repression, and undoing everything Jones did, and..." She trailed off into a moan.

"You need a counselor, Counselor," Theres said, and splashed a bit more of some liquid or other into her tiny glass.

"They're all dealing with everyone else. It's traumatic when Borg invade the ship. It's not helping _them_ that we kept this many of the Borg in question."

Theres didn't ask if she meant "the other counselors" them, or "everyone else on the ship" them. Instead, he asked, "Then maybe you need to get drunk and sleep in?"

"So tempting." She lifted her head enough to bring the shot-glass over and lap out of it. "At least Thirteen is doing well?"

"She's trying to imitate my body-language now. Good thing she hasn't taken it into her head to ask for antennae!" He shook his own head, with his own antennae curling in what Ry'var assumed was amusement. "It's like having a kid around, only she's a lot taller than most."

"Let's hope she can remember something about where she came from," Ry'var sighed. "If we're lucky, she'll have relatives, but we can hardly go looking for every single Romulan outpost and try to get genetic scans."

"I'll do my best," Theres said, soothingly patting her shoulder and refilling her glass.

In the morning, Ry'var supposed the hangover was worth it.


	8. "This unit is waiting."

Physical frailty was something Fourteen was unaccustomed to. It displeased her, in ways that should have been distant and quickly fixed. Nevertheless, the perameters of the situation had not changed. She would be rescued, or she would not be. She would be deemed suitable for repair, or she would be disposed of.

"You really just sit there all the time?" a voice asked.

Fourteen barely focused on the source. It was an irrelevant question.

And yet... she had no data to make predictions.

Earlier, that would not have disturbed her. She did not need to make predictions. She was confined. Her return to the Collective was not within her control.

After the duration of unconsciousness, and the awakening to an altered body with reduced capabilities...

She said, "Yes."

"Why?" the voice asked.

"This unit is waiting."

"What for?"

"For the Collective," she said.

"Why not do something besides just sit there?"

The question was nonsensical, and almost too irrelevant to answer. But she said, "I have no instructions to do otherwise."

"You need _orders_ to do things?"

That _was_ irrelevant. She ignored it.

"Look, if you need orders, there's a lot of people 'round here who'll give 'em. You could take orders from the captain, even, right?"

Fourteen focused on the solitary unit on the other side of the forcefield. "The captain is not of the Collective."

"And glad of it. Look, aren't you bored in there? You need something to read, maybe? Fiction? Star charts? Starfleet regulations?"

Regulations. Rules. Instructions.

Something in Fourteen hungered for instructions, the way her newly-altered organs hungered for the mouth-administered fluids that had been transported into the room once every 24 hours. "Starfleet regulations," she said.

There was a long silence. Then: "I'll get you some this evening if I have to replicate them on paper."

The figure moved to press something on the wall, but before the silence descended again, Fourteen heard the solitary unit say, "Ry'var's gonna _love_ this."

***

Ten of Thirty (an empty designation for a drone separated from everything) knew exactly what had been done to her. She knew what was missing. She knew what had been replaced. There were organs that she had taken from new drones herself, deemed irrelevant to the Collective or even detrimental.

She lacked the display over her eye. She lacked the antennas and maintenance tubing. She lacked many of the shield generators. Her power-supply was reduced. Some of the surface charging plates had been removed, or relocated according to a logic she did not understand.

The numbers could not count down efficiently, for the programs had been corrupted; things that _should not_ be approved... were approved. Or ignored. Or simply not correctly accounted for.

Her right ocular sensor was intact. The data it generated appeared to match her records in all things that she had already scanned. The data about her internal state was plausible.

Ten of Thirty knew the internal workings of many different species, even without accessing the Collective. She knew that not everything had been reverted to a pre-Borg state, messy and imperfect. She knew that she had not even been reverted to the extent that could be done and still expect her continued basic functionality.

But it was hours of work, undone.

More, Eleven's blood had been removed from her hands. It had not been relevant. But it had not been relevant to remove, either. And these individuals were not the Collective, to decide what was and was not relevant to Ten's purpose.

Sometimes she remembered Twelve, who would strike things with a fist when they did not behave properly; a trait barely tolerated, but now fascinating to dwell upon. But Twelve's defect had been countered by Eleven's greater calmness, so the Collective had not needed to concentrate itself upon that part of that Thirty. The matter evened out within the units. And remembering Eleven meant she remembered she had lost all sign of him, and the memories looped.

***

"And this is the bridge," Theres said to Thirteen. He had a firm grip on her upper arm, and there were a fair number of Security loitering around, including Rico, so probably no one would get assimilated even if Thirteen decided to revert. Behind them, Ry'var hovered and held her tail so it wouldn't knock into anything.

Theres let the Romulan Borg tow him to his station, pretending he was guiding her there. "And this is the conn officer's seat. You know how to steer a Federation craft?"

"Yes." Her hands, already reaching for the controls, developed wire-like nanoprobes at the wrists.

Theres made a noise rather like _ack!_ and said, "Fingers only! Don't break my console!"

Wonder of wonders, she stopped, with the quivering tendrils lying across the top of her hands, beside her thumbs, and along the bottom of her least fingers. Wonder of wonders, she turned her head and looked at him. "But this unit must interface with the ship controls."

"If you break my console, _I_ can't fly the ship till it's fixed," Theres pointed out, antennae swinging in agitation as he thought fast. "So, um, here, sit down and I'll show you how _I_ fly it, all right?"

That look was as disappointed as anything, but the charcoal probes retracted back into her wrists and she sat down. Theres wanted to droop all over in relief, but there was a pointy-eared kid waiting for piloting instructions. "Right, so if any of this _non-Borg_ stuff seems familiar, you tell me, got that?" She nodded, and he launched into an explanation of the control surfaces, and let her give the console a few pokes.

After that, things went pretty well. The kid was a natural, and even though she complained at not being able to "directly interface" with the ship, she didn't disobey and she went back to her brig cell with only the kind of sulking that a younger kid would have when they were told to quit playing and get to bed.

So between that and Fourteen condescending to read the Starfleet reg books, Ry'var was in a pretty good mood when they went for celebratory drinks at the lounge.


	9. "Planning to join Starfleet?"

_Things Borg do Not like._

Ry'var supposed she'd have to do proper capitalization of the title if she published it in a journal, but for now, it would do.

_1: Eating. (Mostly only Thirteen eats.)_

_2: Toilets. (Mostly Thirteen complaining.)_

_3: Clothing. At least, clothing where they didn't need to have it before for protection._

_4: Dreams. (Mostly Eight complaining.)_

She could elaborate on those, but putting her head down on the desk was more appealing. She almost wished it were policy to pack non-functional Borg up and ship them back to a random cube. Where, no doubt, they would go crying back to the Collective like kitlings with their tails pulled: "They put back my internal organs! They made me get power from eating instead of nice, efficient energy!"

But that would lose valuable resources, like a shuttle, as well as waste all of the doctor's efforts in reconstructing digestive systems and other internal organs (and then fitting them into place around the power-storage units and whatnot), not to mention the hackeries other people had achieved to suppress the nanites. Ry'var knew that at least two teams were working on how to "reset" the Borg nanites to accept and maintain the newly replaced biological systems as well.

_And_ Security Chief Rico would probably pitch a fit -- in the precise jargon of counseling -- if they tried to send Ten back, and Ten was nearly the very definition of "non-functional Borg."

Ry'var sighed, lifted up her head, and closed the file of _Things Borg do Not like_. Then she opened a mail file to those nanite-hacking teams.

_Subject: Suppressing Assimilation Nanites?_

***

Carefully, Ry'var asked, "And how do you feel?" She was crouched down on her heels, tail curled around her toes and hands clasped hopefully over her knees.

The Klingon behind the forecefield was crouched similarly, but with one elbow propped on a knee, and her other hand stabilizing the pose into the best a non-tailed species could manage. Her reply was untranslatable without two paragraphs of footnotes, and fairly obscene.

"Good, good!" Ry'var said encouragingly. "I'm very glad to hear that! You're recovering."

The Klingon clutched at where the eyepiece remained, fingernails gouging red stripes in her skin. " _This_ is still here!"

"Um. Yes." Ry'var's tail was carefully out of her reach so she wouldn't play with it when giving bad news. "The connections for it go so deep and intricately into your brain that, well, we can't put back an eye and have it work. And leaving the connections 'dangling' might be hazardous, even if you wanted to accept losing the eye."

Twelve -- who hadn't yet volunteered a Klingon name -- slammed her fist into the forcefield, and only Ry'var's Caitian reflexes kept her from rocking back so far she fell over. Twelve yelled, "I still require _power_! I am still a _thing_!"

"But you aren't being controlled by the Collective anymore!" Ry'var said, hoping that reminder would get the Klingon woman focused on the _good_ side of the situation.

"I am held prisoner by Federation cowards! Because we are at _war_!" She slammed both fists into the ground.

Carefully, Ry'var said, "We want to get you back to your people. It's just going to be a little awkward, and it'll be easier for everyone if you don't get too much of a look at anything on the ship that's 'sensitive.' But we want to get you back to your home."

That expression... Well, probably Klingon disdain, primarily. Twelve snarled, "My _home_. Was assimilated." Then she turned around and rested a shoulder against the wall, showing her back to the forcefield.

Ry'var was about to stand up and turn off the intercom when Twelve added, "There must be records of the Great Houses. Which are ascendent."

That comment snapped in a bunch of puzzle-pieces Ry'var hadn't even realized existed. It was the oblique question from someone who, perhaps, technically owed fealty to a House that had been on shaky ground at one point. And it also answered why Twelve hadn't given a Klingon name. Some Borg lost memories of their lives pre-assimilation, if they were kept long enough before rescue. And some had disassociation issues, where they didn't want to try to integrate back into their former lives, according to the scanty literature Ry'var'd been able to dig up.

If one's House was in disgrace, it might not be a bad thing for a Klingon to decide exactly how much she intended to "remember" _before_ she got dropped back on Q'onoS.

"I'll see about getting you the unclassified records," Ry'var said. "Please try to eat a little, as well as power the other systems?"

Twelve grunted, but didn't punch anything or swear. Hopefully that was a good sign?

***

"You're reading the regs in species-order?"

Fourteen didn't look up from the tablet in her hands. After a while, because if she didn't answer the pointless question, someone would probably ask it again, she said, "Yes."

"A lot of the material's pretty much the same, last I looked."

Again, failing to respond would probably get more interruptions. "Yes."

"Planning to join Starfleet?"

Irritation was irritating. She missed the enforced calm of the Collective. She looked up, registered the species as having the Starfleet designation of _Andorian_ , and said, "I haven't finished reading the regulations yet."

The Andorian raised its hands and backed away from the forcefield. "Okay, okay, I'm leaving."

Fourteen dipped her head to read again. Interfacing might have been faster, but without the Collective, processing the data might take enough time to cancel out the efficiency of an interface.

Besides, this passed the time. Severed from the Collective, modified by these chattering individuals... Fourteen was patient, but even her patience had limits before the concept of "boredom" drifted in.

***

Ry'var updated her file of _Things Borg do Not like_.

_5\. Lack of proper regulation-following on the part of security guards for the brig. (Fourteen. Pointing each failure out.)_

At least Rico thought it was funny.

_6\. Having their nanites suppressed._

That was from all of them except Twelve and Sixteen. Even the last hold-out against "Talking To Counselor Ry'var," Ten, had taken to looking sorrowfully at the places where natural healing had to proceed at a natural pace -- the nanites suppressed so they wouldn't undo Doctor Jones' work, and standard accelerated healing techniques rendered mostly ineffective because of interference from the _presence_ of the suppressed nanites.

Or, in the short form, they were all going to have some scars here and there.

Ry'var went back and underlined "eating" and "toilets" a few more times.

Her mail alert trilled at her, and she checked it. Then she sat up straight and re-read the message, tail and ears perking up.

And _then_ she sent a message to Theres: _They've figured out how to suppress the assimilation nanites for a few hours at a time! Celebration when you're off-shift?_


	10. "You're the only one."

Unconsciousness was less unpleasant than awareness. Awareness after unconsciousness was more unpleasant, for Ten of Thirty woke inside the cell and not in her recharging station.

This time, though, the forcefield was down. Individuals with weapons were outside the cell. Two were within it, weapons trained upon her. And one, without weapons showing, crouched in front of her, a long tail curled over her bare feet.

Ten's throat was dry, and she knew there would be no harmonies from other voices. Still, she croaked, "You will be assimilated," and raised her arm toward the one in front of her. The nanoprobes in her wrist attempted to spring forth -- and failed, clicking against the metal band that covered the ports.

She pulled her arm back and activated her eyepiece, which had shut down to conserve power. The band was not one that could be drilled through easily. Worse, diagnostics now reported malfunctions in the assimilation nanites. Even if she were able to remove the band, there would be no response to instructions to inject and assimilate.

Her mind rang with emptiness. She let the arm drop. Her other wrist was also covered. The Collective could not instruct her on what to do next, and she was... tired.

She closed her eye and allowed the eyepiece to power down again.

"Come on," the furred individual said, and there were hands on Ten's arms, pulling her up. "I'm not going to let you lie down and die."

Balance had eroded along with everything else. The armed individuals were required to support Ten for her to remain standing. Their weapons remained aimed at her. She experimented with opening and closing her eye, but neither seemed to help much. "Return this unit to the Collective," she tried.

"Why would you want to go _back_?" asked one of the armed individuals holding her upright.

"Units Twenty through Thirty, of Thirty, were confirmed as transported back," she said. Her throat hurt. Nanite malfunctions prevented mending.

The first individual was silent. The individual at her other side -- the one she had once mistaken for Eleven -- said, "That cube was destroyed."

The tailed individual said, "S'saik! You didn't have to tell her that."

The concept came to Ten that perhaps these individuals would give her data, even if she could not interface with their ship's computer, or assimilate them. "Where are the others?" she asked.

"Others?" the tailed one said.

"Eight of Thirty. Twelve of Thirty." They had been unharmed. Ten tried to swallow. Her throat hurt. "Eleven of Thirty."

The individuals were silent. It was baffling. Where was the data? Why would they give data before, but not now?

The first armed individual said, "You're the only one. I'm sorry."

It was _pain_ , somehow. A concept the Collective knew, distantly, and dismissed as irrelevant. But those minds had been her mind. And now they were gone. All of them.

It wasn't supposed to hurt, to be aware that certain drones would not be there beside one. That the capabilities of the others, that she had known as well as her own, would not be present.

It wasn't supposed to hurt.

But it did.

"Ahgk, don't fall down!" one of the individuals said.

It was something like instruction. She managed to catch herself, half-kneeling.

"Stand up." That was the one tentatively designated _S'saik_.

The words rang through the emptiness, where the Collective should have been. Where her Thirty should have been. Rang through it. Fell into it. Were all but lost.

And yet she stood, obedient.

"Well," said the tailed one. "Ah, let's go for a walk. Here, let me introduce us. I'm called Ry'var. That's Rico on your right, and S'saik on your left. Can you take a step? There, that's good..."

All those words could not fill the hole within her.

They were, slightly, better than silence.

The instructions to walk did not come from the Collective.

But they were instructions.

They walked through corridors that curved and were nothing like the proper straight lines of a cube. They instructed Ten to drink water, and it was messy and unpleasant and she couldn't breathe and drink at the same time, so it hurt her throat more before it soothed, as her body coughed and coughed in reflexes she had never had to suppress before.

And after they had returned to the cell, beside others with the forcefields opaque and silent, the one designated Ry'var had Ten sit on the ledge within the cell and hold out her hands. Then Ry'var slipped inefficient coverings over the charging plates in Ten's hands, and energy flowed.

"You've had a busy day," Ry'var said. "You can rest now, all right?"

"This unit will recharge," Ten said, and closed her eye and powered down her eyepiece.

The energy that came from the battery, linked to the hand-coverings, was almost -- _almost_ \-- comforting.


	11. "Any ideas?"

_7\. Being alone in their heads._

Ry'var just stared at that one on the pad for a while, chin in her hand, till Theres let himself into her room -- she'd programmed the door to do that, in case he left something there and had to get it back -- and flopped down on the floor next to her, with his own elbows on the coffee table. He leaned across her shoulder, antennae pricked up almost like a Caitian's ears.

She passed him the tablet. "Any ideas?"

"Thirteen's doing pretty good. We were looking at star maps, and she mentioned Gasko Station as being familiar. Something about docking there. Maybe we could swing by, see if anyone has any clues?"

"I hope that she'll be recovered enough to fit in, mostly," Ry'var said. "I worry that Romulans might be cruel to people who are different."

"You'd think they'd have sense enough not to mess with a Borg. That assimilation-suppression thing needs an injection of hacked nanites, only works a few hours, and then they have to do an entirely new rotation approach to it, because the Borg's nanites have adapted." He ticked the drawbacks off on his fingers.

"I worry that they'll just _kill_ them, now!" She put her chin on the table and clutched at her ears. "Maybe we should send Ten to Vulcan after all? Get Setek there first, give them a head start integrating him back into society..."

Theres got up and got them both drinks -- non-alcoholic ones, since he was going to be on-shift soon. "I think it'd be a terrible idea. Logic doesn't give a Borg something to live _for_ , without the Collective, and Infinite knows, that kid needs something. Friends. People. Not to be alone."

"You don't think they'd arrange a marriage for her with some nice young fellow and get her set up as a... Vulcan homemaker, or something?"

"They're _Vulcans_ , Ry. If they set her up with anyone, it'd probably be some ancient widower who they thought could reprogram her little Borgy brain and eliminate the threat. And that's if they didn't decide she should go meditate for the rest of her life, since there's a good chance she's got Romulan cooties. Sweet Infinite, between the probable Romulan genetics and her nanites, the kid's _entirely composed_ of cooties."

Ry'var sat up and giggled, then sobered. "Theres, when did we start thinking of them as kids? Her and Thirteen, Eight and Fourteen... They're Borg."

"They got stuffed in maturation tanks as kids," he pointed out. "And they're dangerous kids now, but... I dunno. I was just as crazy to fly stuff as Thirteen is, when I was..."

"Her age?" Ry'var sipped her drink.

"Her real age, maybe. Or whatever it was when the Borg got her."

"I wish we could drop her and Ten off at the same place, but I can't pretend they wouldn't try to put their minds back into a tiny little collective of two. And if that happens? They're lonely little Borg children, and the doctor says she can't turn off their assimilation-abilities entirely."

"That claim kind of smells, you know." He had a gulp of his own drink. "There've been other Borg pulled out, like Seven of Nine, and none of them _weren't_ de-fanged, from what I've heard."

The bottom of the cup held no answers. "You want to confront her on that one?"

"Not till she's figured out how to make Sixteen something less than seventy-five percent mechanical."

"So we get to figure out how to socialize Borg kids into the idea that assimilation is bad."

"Unless someone asks..." Theres mused.

She was about to say _what??_ \-- but then it clicked, and her ears went up and her tailtip flipped around excitedly. "Like little children and hugging, or stealing each other's toys! Boundaries! Of course! Borg are _terrible_ with boundaries. But so are little kids! They _are_ children! Theres, you're a genius!" She leaned over and hugged him tightly.

"Aw, don't tell anyone. You'll ruin my reputation," he protested, but he hugged her back, one-armed because he was holding the drink in the other. "I gotta get to my post, so don't go licking my head again, either!"

She laughed, licked one of his antennae, and got up. As she gave him a hand up off the floor as well, she said, "And I have to go see if I can get some Borg children to play nicely with everyone else. But I do think this is the key to getting a breakthrough!"

Ry'var hugged him again before they left her quarters, and she bounced off happily, leaving Theres vainly brushing light brown Caitian fur off his uniform for a few seconds before he shrugged and headed for the bridge.

***

Ry'var's first stop was Sickbay. Technically, since the captain had granted "the Borg problem" to Ry'var, she was Setek's assigned counselor as well. In practice, he spent most of his time meditating, and all things considered... She'd decided "keep the Vulcan stable till we get him home" was her real mandate.

She'd timed her visit right: he was eating his breakfast. (It was useful that Vulcans preferred light, broth-based breakfasts. Setek's digestive system had been more fully reconstructed than the younger Borgs', but it was still "settling in," as the doctor put it.) Trusting him to complain if she was bothering him, she slipped inside the privacy curtains and onto the stool near the medical bed.

He ignored her for several spoonfuls of broth, then finally said, "I am continuing to function acceptably for a patient."

"That's good to know," Ry'var said, carefully neutral. She thought over what she was going to say for a few minutes. "Do you want Ten taken to Vulcan eventually?"

"I thought she had been designated Romulan."

"It's the doctor's best guess. But I had a modest breakthrough with her yesterday, so now we have to decide how to socialize her. You're the only person on this ship who might really know if I should be teaching her how to meditate, or how to laugh."

He closed his eyes and sank against the raised back of the sickbay bed. Finally, eyes still closed, he said, "Teach her... how to love, without assimilating."

That was not a sentence Ry'var had expected from him. She blinked at him, trying to order her thoughts. "Er, thank you."

Barely above a whisper, Setek said, "Now leave."

She made a small, agreeing noise and slid off the stool and out of the "room" made of privacy curtains -- and forcefields.


	12. "It's a tribble."

When the forcefield before her cell went down, Ten raised her arm and absently attempted to extend the nanoprobes to the tailed individual, designation _Ry'var_. The probes continued to tap uselessly against the bracelet. She supposed she could concentrate and attempt to burrow the probes through the skin, under the cuff, but...

It would not bring back any of her Thirty. It would not connect her to the Collective.

There really wasn't any relevancy to trying very hard.

When she'd lowered her arm again, Ry'var stepped across the threshold. The individual was carrying something furred and rounded in one hand. "Good morning, Ten. I brought you... well, sort of a guest, I suppose."

"Ten of Thirty," she corrected absently.

"Well, you're the only Ten of anything on the ship, so let's save the full 'Ten of Thirty' for formal occasions, all right?"

It made sense. Relayed designations only needed to be long enough to identify the drone or ship, so commands did not go to the wrong member of a thirty. Or the wrong ship. "Acceptable," she said.

"Oh, good. Anyway. I thought we might have some more explicit lessons in getting along with people, today! We can't keep you in the brig forever, after all."

They couldn't? She was distracted from that thought by Ry'var bending and placing the object on Ten's lap. After a moment, it vibrated slightly and made a trilling sound.

"It's a tribble," Ry'var said. "One of the crew had one, so we fed it a little extra, and it had babies. Go ahead and pet it. They like that."

It took some moments, without access to the Collective, to recall what "pet" meant in that context. It was an instruction, and so Ten put her palm upon the creature. It fit within the curve of hand and fingers, and was soft and somewhat warm. It made the sound again. She activated her eyepiece and scanned it. Nothing but the organic material expected.

"Do you like that?"

Irrelevant question. She lifted her hand and placed it upon the animal again, in case some relevancy might appear, but it did not. The non-sapient being, designation _tribble_ , continued to be soft, furred, somewhat warm, and with a tendency to vibrate and make quiet noises of a particular frequency.

"How do you feel about it?"

She managed to acquire an answer. "It is of no use to the Collective."

"Hm." Ry'var sat down on the other side of the cell's ledge. "So you wouldn't try to assimilate it even if your wrists were uncovered?"

"No." She held the tribble up in both hands and scanned it more thoroughly. It was extremely useless.

"But you'd try to assimilate me if you could?"

Ten lowered the tribble back onto her knees, but left her palms cupped around it. "Yes."

"Because I would be of use to the Collective?"

"These drones were sent to this ship to assimilate it." It was a reflex action, not requiring further directives from the Collective. Ten considered the logistics, analyzing the probable results. "The effort would be unproductive now."

"So if the wrist-cuffs were off, you wouldn't try to assimilate anyone?"

"We could not take the ship and return to the Collective." Outnumbered, with the assimilation process taking a finite amount of time, during which the rest of the individuals would react... Ten was currently unsure whether she could convince her own nanites to repair the communications systems that would allow her to integrate with a new drone, let alone with the Collective... And could she even command as One of Two? One of Thirty would have been able to, but he was gone with the others. Without the Collective to take control, a new drone might impose _its_ will upon _Ten_ ; she might instead become Two of Two, with a leader who wanted only to return to individuality.

Ry'var said, "There are ways to interact with people that don't involve assimilating them. You can hold a tribble and not even want to assimilate it, right?"

"It is of no use to the Collective." Nor was it likely to be of any use in returning to the Collective. Without limbs, it could not move quickly through the ship. She held it up again anyway. It certainly would be unlikely to challenge her for leadership of a small unity. Perhaps if communications were possible, it could be used to assimilate others, if these individuals did not realize what had happened and took it out of the cell?

But constructing even the simplest of nanite-factories within it, and a probe to deliver them, would take time and material resources that could not be leeched from its boneless body.

And it would still not bring back any of her Thirty.

"Why do you want to go back to the Collective?"

That question went beyond irrelevance and into... There were no words. Why did planets orbit stars? Why was perfection to be sought? Why was _space_? Ten twitched her head around to stare at the Ry'var individual.

Carefully, Ry'var said, "Please tell me why you want to go back. I want to understand. But I don't want to be a drone."

That was enough of an instruction... It was like picking through molten shards in her mind. Images. Words. Concepts that had flickered at the edges of the unified voice of the Collective. She fell back on basic truths. "This unit... is Borg. This unit serves the Collective."

"But why do you _want_ to?"

"The Collective... seeks perfection. This unit serves the Collective."

Ry'var's tail wrapped around her ankles, as if it were controlled by something besides the individual it was attached to. "It's aesthetics? A form of pleasure?"

Words with definitions in pieces and fragments. Irrelevancies wrapped in the most relevant concepts. "...yes?"

"What if I told you that you could find aesthetics -- or pleasure, or good experiences -- as a person, not just a drone?"

"It would not serve the Collective." She was on firmer footing with that.

"You need to have a purpose, too, then? A lot of people do..."

Emotions ran in circles inside her skull, in ways that should have been suppressed by the Collective. In ways that would have been soothed by minds in the Thirty before they even reached the greater awareness of the Collective. "This unit serves the Collective!" she snapped.

"Why not something else, though? You have that choice now!"

"Choice is irrelevant," Ten growled, and found herself hunched over her arms, which were holding the tribble. She frowned at it, then thrust it back at Ry'var. "Go away."

The individual took the animal and tucked it into the crook of her arm as she stood. "All right. We can talk about this more after you've thought about it some."

Ten waited till she had left, and the forcefields had gone up again. The emotions did not fade, were not suppressed, were not soothed. Quietly and firmly, she said, " _Hu'tegh._ "

It perhaps helped, a very small amount.


	13. "I am still reading."

Eight did not like the gloves. She had been rendered unconscious again, and when she had regained awareness, she had been wearing them. They were metal, over fabric, and the tips were nothing but metal caps over the first joint of each finger, and thus preventing her from extending her nanoprobes. The gloves were locked onto her hands at the wrist.

She considered the situation. Prying at the gloves had produced no results. She considered the resources she had. 

She tried biting them.

"Don't do that," the Ry'var unit said. "You might hurt your teeth."

"Take these off," Eight said, holding out one hand.

"Would you try to assimilate me?"

The reflexive answer was _Yes._ It should not even have needed to be asked.

And yet. She had been promised repairs, and they had not happened. But the Ry'var unit continued to come and speak to Eight.

And individuals often resisted assimilation. It was a fact, and the reasons for it had always been irrelevant.

Carefully, Eight said, "Take these off me and prepare for assimilation."

The Ry'var unit started to shake her head, then paused and tilted her head instead. "No," she said, with a rough, pleased note to her voice. "No, I don't think I will. But well done, Eight. That was a very good sentence."

***

The appearance of metal gloves that covered Fourteen's fingertip nanoprobes was... inconvenient. But she had been reading the regulations on the pad without interfacing to it anyway. She picked at the gloves long enough to determine that they would not come off with application of any of her meager resources, and went back to reading.

"Would you like to take a walk sometime?" asked the lifeform the regulations designated as _Caitian_ , who wore coverings that were not designated _Uniforms_.

"No," Fourteen said.

"Why not?"

"I am still reading." She had gotten to the entry for _Humans_ , cross-referenced with _Terrans_.

"Oh. All right. Do you use pronouns to refer to yourself often?"

The question made Fourteen lose her place briefly. But, really, it was irrelevant. "I am not done reading," she said.

The odd noises the Caitian made were mildly distracting, but Fourteen focused on the pad and ignored them.


	14. "Hu'tegh!"

Ry'var was grinning, Caitian-style, when Theres got off-duty and dropped in. "Pronouns! Both of the humans were using pronouns to refer to themselves! And Thirteen has been tracing patterns in the star-charts we got her, that look like plausible trading paths!" She danced over to the replicator and got the drinks this time, tail swinging around and somehow not hitting anything.

Theres flopped on the couch and eyed that tail, trying to decide if he was alarmed or going to appreciate her coordination -- or luck, depending. He accepted the drink, even though it had no alcohol content, and toasted her with it. "Sounds like you've been getting breakthroughs."

"All of them but Ten, and even then... Well, she's displaying emotional reactions, and that's hopefully a start in breaking down her Borg conditioning." Ry'var settled beside him. "And how was _your_ day?"

"Flew the ship." He grinned at her. "Sounds like it'd be boring, but I could watch starfields at warp forever. Captain's got us edging to some of the places we might be able to contact Klingons about an ex-Borg transfer."

"Oh, good. I'm glad he took my recommendation about that. Twelve may not be admitting to who she was before assimilation, but I'm pretty sure she doesn't want to stay with us a moment longer than she has to."

"I'm just hoping if we find Klingons, we'll have long enough to explain we're on a mission of honor before they start dropping torps on us." Theres wasn't one to run away from a good fight, but there was something irritating about the idea that they might _start_ a fight before Captain Tuskany got a chance to say, _Hey, bringin' your kinswoman back._

Ry'var reached out and ruffled his hair. "We'll be fine. You'll roll us away while the captain talks fast, and at the end of it, Twelve will be on her way home."

***

Three days later, Theres was indeed rolling the ship away from a spread of torpedoes from _two_ Klingon birds of prey, while Tuskany shouted, "You are _damning_ your kinswoman! She is in our brig and if you destroy our ship, she will have no chance of Sto'vo'kor!"

The Klingon captain on a corner of the viewscreen snarled back, "What does a _qoH_ know of honor?!"

"Enough to know that if you deny her a chance to die in honorable combat, it does _you_ no good either, _petaQ_!" Tuskany growled.

"Then bring this kinswoman, if she exists at all, _bIHnuch_!" the Klingon demanded, while Theres hunched over his console and tried to out-speed another cluster of torps. It was a good thing that the Klingons were willing to talk; the pair of them could probably have taken out one little Federation ship in a few minutes if they'd been serious.

"Brace!" called the captain, and they all grabbed hold as the ship shuddered at the impact. Tuskany bared teeth at the screen before ordering, "Rico! Get our Klingon guest up here, on the double!"

 _"Aye, sir!"_ came the response from the comm.

Theres hissed a few comments of his own, while Tuskany turned and made a "sound off" gesture at Oshni. His fellow Andorian canted one of her antennae at the captain and murmured, "Done, sir."

Still facing away from the screen, Tuskany said, "If they don't break off when we get that Borg up here, prepare torpedoes of our own. We can always find more Klingons where these came from."

"Yessir," said Tac, with echoes from the rest of them, as if it wouldn't be a nasty fight with a good chance of losing.

"Good. Sound back on, please."

Theres continued to dodge and weave -- and roll -- while Tuskany and the Klingon captain traded insults, which lasted far longer than Theres liked. Finally, Rico and S'saik made their appearance, with the Klingon Borg between them. Twelve was wearing the metal nanoprobe-blocking gloves, and a huge scowl.

" _Hu'tegh!_ " the Klingon on the viewscreen said as Twelve stalked into view of the cameras.

Much to Theres' annoyance, he was forced to continue trying to avoid Klingon weapons while the ex-Borg and un-introduced captain screamed and shouted at each other for a while. It meant he couldn't pay as much attention as he'd have liked -- Klingons had the best insults.

He perked his antennae up when the Klingon captain said, "Attack the Federation filth, then! Prove yourself worthy!"

Damned thing, to know that it was a human and a Vulcan who were guarding Theres' back while he flung the ship into maneuvers that were going to get him screamed at by Engineering later, individually and _en masse_.

But Twelve shrieked back, " _They saved me!_ I would have died _Borg_!"

There was a silence between the two Klingons. Tuskany's quiet, terse "Power to structural integrity fields" fell into it. Another moment while the second Klingon ship tried to put a heavy torp where torps should never go, and Tac nailed it with a phaser shot just in time.

Captain Tuskany said, "Twelve of Thirty, I hear that Borg have a way with computers. If you have to battle to get to Sto'vo'kor, I can have those gloves taken off and put you at my Tactical station."

It was enough to make Theres glance over his shoulder in shock. He watched long enough to see Twelve turn back from her own startled look at the captain, to stare at the viewscreen. She thrust out a hand to Rico, still locking her gaze to her fellow Klingon's. "Today," she said, "is a _good_ day to die."

Theres wrenched his eyes back to his console, vaguely wishing he could interface with it like Thirteen had wanted to -- but not enough to ask any of them for a dose of nanites of his very own -- and prepared to shift to the offensive instead of just dodging. With luck, it'd be a good day for someone _else_ to die.

And the Klingon captain spat " _Hu'tegh!_ again, in an admiring tone. Then, glancing off-screen to someone on his own bridge, he said, "Call off the attack! Today, we bring our sister home!"


	15. "That would be acceptable."

"This unit--" Thirteen began.

"Say 'I'," Theres corrected.

" _I_! Could have helped! This ship was in combat! And this un-- _I_ wasn't there!" The Romulan Borg scowled at him and self-consciously put her hands on her hips.

It was all Theres could do not to crack up. "We, ah..." He coughed and mastered his amusement at her posing. "We didn't have time to bring you up to the bridge."

With all the slyness of a toddler, Thirteen suggested, "This u... I could fly the ship for you now. For days and days. Because you have done a good job and should have a rest and relaxation."

Theres broke into another bout of coughing so he didn't fall down laughing. When he recovered, he said, tightly, "I'll ask the captain if it would be permitted." His antenna quivered.

Thirteen folded her arms, regal as a princess of the playroom. "That would be acceptable."

"Gotta go," Theres said, and made it out of the brig before he sagged against the wall and cackled until he could barely breathe.

Sweet Infinite, but he was gonna miss that kid.

***

"I am still reading," Fourteen said. "If you do not go away, I will assimilate you."

"Assimilation is against Starfleet regulations," the other person said. "And you're behind a forcefield, wearing anti-assimilation gloves."

It was enough to make her glance up, identify Security Chief Rico, and go back to the pad. "I have not found Borg regulations yet," she said.

"And you're not in Starfleet yet, either," he said.

Fourteen ignored him and his irrelevant distractions. She had another version of the regulations to finish, with all the species-specific notations to analyze for the underlying rules. Once she understood the underlying assumptions and rules, she could certainly extrapolate what the proper regulation behavior would be in _any_ circumstance.

Some of the rules seemed inconsistent. She was making note of those. She would point them out to the brig guards later.


	16. "You looked wistful."

"We'll miss you," Ry'var told Setek.

He forbore to say that he would miss none of them, though it was almost entirely true. He forbore to say that she only wished him to remain so he might provide more information regarding the other... The Borg. He forbore to look at the bandage wrapped over the charging port on his right wrist.

Instead, he said, "You will need the bed for the Andorian, eventually." He did not call it Sixteen, though that was all the name he had for it, and as its gender had not been relevant to the Collective... Setek had not even a pronoun.

He still did not look at the site of the charging port, or at the converter that had been prepared and now rested beside his feet. It was marked "medical equipment."

Borg became dependent on the artificial controllers in their brains, and those controllers could fail. The doctor had loaded maintenance programs into the nanites remaining in Setek's body, so he would not die if the controller failed. But nanites required power; so while bioconversion was possible, he had been told, it would require a greater amount of food than he wished to spend the time to consume. It would have been illogical to insist on an unnecessary risk to his life, just to avoid requiring more efficient forms of power.

Ry'var said, "Yes, I suppose so." For a moment Setek had to backtrace to the verbal part of the conversation. Fortunately, there really wasn't anything that was relevant-- He stopped that thought. --that required further reply.

He had not been able to properly meditate since the preparations to move him had begun. But once he was on the Vulcan ship that would rendezvous with them in the next few minutes, he would be able to return to meditation.

Setek looked forward to a proper environment for that. Candles. Lack of reflective surfaces that might glint off the few remaining Borg components, and mark him as Eleven of Thirty before he recovered. A warm darkness that would be nothing like the twisted blackness of a cube. 

"I'm glad you'll be back with your people," Ry'var said, and when he looked, she had the corner of her mouth curled in a wry, human-influenced smile, while her tail was wrapped over her knees and around the back of her calves. She correctly recognized his confusion at her change of approach, and said, "You looked wistful."

The transporter officer said, "We're in range. Ready to beam you over."

Setek was relieved he would not have to make further conversation. He remembered to nod to Ry'var, and to the security guard who had accompanied them. He remembered to stoop and pick up the "medical equipment." Then he strode to the transporter pad and waited for the glitter to take him away from this human ship, on the first step of a journey back to Vulcan. And, he hoped, back to peace with himself.

***

"Look," Doctor Jones said distractedly, "it's _really hard_ to remake someone's body when about all that's left that's organic is two thirds of their brain and a little bit around the face, okay? And that's _without_ Theres and Tuskany throwing the ship around playing with Klingons. What do you need?"

Ry'var wrapped her tail around her legs. "I just wanted to know if it would be possible to turn off the remaining lot's assimilation nanites."

"Unfortunately, no. The programs that make the nanites maintain the non-organic systems are too easily re-adapted to inserting non-organic systems in other people. Once people land in Sickbay, my oath kicks in. I'm not going to start the clock ticking on their bodies shutting down. Seven of Nine was _lucky_ they'd pried out some other Borg kids who didn't have the same system-reliance on that chip, so they got a doner. These kids have already used up their luck when Rico didn't beam 'em into space. Now, will that be all?"

"Yes, doctor," Ry'var said, and slunk out.


	17. "Family's important."

"Ship on sensors," came the report.

"On screen," said Tuskany. "Magnify as much as we can for details."

The display was of a standard cargo-ship. Tuskany didn't sigh at it, but did ask, "It's got a heading for Gasko?"

"It does, sir."

"Hail it."

"Yes, sir."

The face that appeared, after a slightly longer than usual time for a hail, was the dark, slant-eyebrowed sort that Tuskany'd been hoping for. Her hair was pulled into a bun, away from her face, and those were Romulan forehead ridges, all right. She glowered at the screen. "Yes?"

Tuskany said, "Greetings! This is the Federation ship _Gracie_." Always a hard one to explain, since it was named after a _whale_. "We're looking for the family of a... refugee we've taken on. Would you be willing to help?"

The woman's suspicious expression didn't lighten much. "What kind of refugee?"

Rubbing one's face in front of the viewscreen cameras wasn't professional, so Tuskany didn't do that. "A young Romulan woman, ma'am. One we rescued from the Borg. She doesn't remember her name, but she seemed to think Gasko Station was familiar. We're pretty sure she was assimilated as a child, but she's been recovering amazingly well."

There was the incredulous stare, though it didn't last as long as expected before the woman's eyebrows went down. "Send over an image."

"Of course, ma'am," Tuskany said, and waved for Oshni to do so. "Both of her current appearance, and our doctor's projections of what she would've looked like without Borg... interference."

After another suspicious glance, the Romulan looked to the side. She frowned, then frowned harder. Then her eyes went wide. "That looks like my cousin's wife!" She looked up. "My cousin married a widow some years ago -- trader family. They'd lost a ship with Jaeih's first husband on it... there'd been Borg activity in that area, so there was a chance that he'd been assimilated, and my cousin had to wait till she decided she was a widow after all."

"Do you know if one of her children was on the ship, too?"

The woman shook her head. "This is family gossip -- mother talking about her brother's son's troubles in marrying Jaeih. Either she didn't know about any children, or thought that part was too private to share. Or my uncle didn't share, or my cousin didn't share." She gave a shrug that clearly indicated: _Relatives! Who can explain 'em?_ Then she continued, "But they're a trader family, so if any of the children had half an aptitude, they'd have been brought on when they were old enough to stay out from underfoot. It wouldn't surprise me, and the extrapolated image looks a _lot_ like Jaeih."

"Would you be willing to point us in your cousin's direction, ma'am?" Tuskany asked.

Her expression closed down again. "No. No, a Federation ship wouldn't be welcome in that area, and even if you got there safely... It could cause trouble."

"Well." Tuskany took a breath and was just a little glad Theres hadn't come on duty yet. "Would you be willing to take her home, then? She's friendly, absolutely fixated on flying ships, and has been trying to imitate one of my pilots."

"Not a Vulcan, I hope," the woman said dryly.

"Andorian. I think he's been trying to convince himself he could adopt her, but if she's got family who're missing her..."

She snorted. "I'll have to talk to some of the other crew, but... It would be good to bring back Jaeih's child. I'm on this ship because she married my cousin, after all." Her voice had turned warmer.

Tuskany nodded. "Family's important. Ah, there are a few other things."

"Oh?" The suspicion was instantly back.

"Mostly care-and-feeding of kids who need electricity as much as food. A few other tidbits... I'd rather not share over the comm. I could send over the counselor who's been working with her, or someone could beam over here?"

The woman didn't look too happy with that. "Any hints?"

After a bit of finger-tapping on the edge of the captain's chair, and deciding maybe it wasn't too sensitive after all, Tuskany said, "She wasn't the only survivor, though we've told her she was, because we were afraid they'd try to link back up in a private Collective. We're less concerned about Thirteen -- the one whose picture we showed you, Borg-designation Thirteen of Thirty. She's been outward-focused and has wandered around the ship with only minimal security. The other one..." Tuskany grimaced slightly.

"Images?"

Tuskany waved for Oshni to repeat sending both the current Ten and a projection of her appearance without the Borg modifications.

This time the Romulan woman shook her head. "No, this could be anyone. Vulcan girl, even, for she doesn't bear the wings."

Tuskany supposed the common Romulan forehead ridges could look like a stylized flying thing, mid-flap; not a typical phrase, but families could have their own jargon, too. "It took a while to figure out her species, but our doctor finally decided she was one of your people."

"If we take on the one who's probably Jaeih's, we could bring on this one as well, I suppose..."

Now it was Tuskany's turn for a head-shake. "We'd like to keep Ten separated from Thirteen. Ten's... kind of a work in progress, socialization-wise." That was nearly a quote from Ry'var. "If they're not related, they probably shouldn't be on the same planet."

"I see. Well, let me talk to people about Jaeih's daughter."

"Of course, ma'am. And I'll warn her and our pilot that you might be able to take her home."


	18. "She's making good progress."

Ry'var wrung her tail between her hands while Theres hugged Thirteen -- and told her not to let strange men hug her for a while, because it was only for close friends, but if she was good and didn't try to assimilate anyone or interface with the consoles, maybe the trader-ship would let her fly it sometimes. Security Chief Rico gave his own grave farewells. S'saik unbent enough to give a terse, rather stilted, "...live long and prosper," if only because Ry'var weepily glared at him till he said _something_.

Even Tuskany was in the transporter room, offering a hand to both the Romulan woman who'd come to collect Thirteen (who'd been fascinated by someone who looked more like her), and to Thirteen herself.

Then the transporter's sparkles whisked them back to the trader-ship, and everyone else was left standing around, slightly awkwardly. Ry'var wished she could drag Theres off to the ship's lounge, but he was supposed to be on duty, and only Tuskany's permission had let him come along anyway.

Still, she took his arm and patted him on the shoulder. "They know which ship brought her. Maybe she'll be able to write."

"Yeah, maybe."

He was turning for the door when Tuskany's communicator beeped. "Captain! There's a small warbird, just decloaked! They're hailing us."

"On my way!" Tuskany said, and strode out of the room. Theres followed quickly, and Rico and S'saik were on his heels. Ry'var lashed her tail once, then bounced off after Theres.

When they got to the bridge, Tuskany took the captain's chair, of course, while Theres swapped into the helm's seat. Ry'var snagged the secondary console for Comm, lifting her whiskers in a smile at Oshni, who hadn't gone off-duty yet.

"On screen," Tuskany said.

The man who appeared was Romulan, as one would expect from a decloaked warbird. He was white-haired, and _not_ wearing a standard uniform. Ry'var let herself be hopeful.

"Sir," Tuskany said. "This is Captain Tuskany of the Federation ship _Gracie_. Is there a problem?"

"I hope not, Captain. I'm Commander Malem. I hear you have a spare refugee left, a bit on the pale and numerically-designated side."

"We do, Commander. We're hoping to find her family, or at least leave her with people who'll look after her and not take her apart for Borg secrets."

Malem said, "I know a place that could use extra hands for farming and building, and wouldn't be too picky about where they came from, and it's a different planet from the one the traders are based on. Is the girl ready for transport?"

Tuskany turned to look at Ry'var. "Counselor?"

Ry'var wrapped her tail around her legs so she couldn't get it into her hands. "Well, yes and no, sir. I'd... like a few more days to prepare her for the idea."

" _Much_ less functional than the other one, eh?" Commander Malem said.

"Mm," Ry'var said. "We're still working on the 'don't assimilate people just because you're lonely' concept."

The Romulan man snorted. "All right. I can't stay long -- I'm under contract to escort this trader through a few patches of space. I'll beam over some coordinates for a place a little less sensitive for you. I'll meet you there in... about fourteen days, if I have the conversion right. I can take the girl back to the colony then, if you think she's safe." He chuckled. "And if she's not, you can keep her and let her assimilate Vulcan!"

"I'll do my best, sir," Ry'var said. "She's making good progress."

"Good luck," Malem told her. "Elements know we could use the help."

"Thank you," she said.

"Be seeing you," Malem said, and with a nod apparently aimed at Tuskany, closed down the connection. The viewscreen shifted to the image of the round-bodied little warbird, which cloaked again.

Tuskany said, "Give them a little while to get clear of us, and a bit longer for the traders to move off and not send distress calls, and then... Those coordinates look good, Lieutenant Th'vath?"

Theres reported, "They do, sir."

"Then let's head there. Ry'var?"

"Yes, sir?"

"Work on more breakthroughs with Ten."

"Yes, sir." She nodded and headed for the turbolift.


	19. "The Federation calls them Romulans."

Metal, Ten had finally realized, was a resource. The bracelets that covered her nanoprobes were metal. And while they were not the best material to break down into parts... It was not impossible.

Cut off from the Collective, she had very little processing power; effecting change in the nanite programming was difficult, and she had not been tuned for turning raw resources into more useable ones. It drained power. She had been forced to ingest the fluids as well as tap the limited power-cell she had been provided.

But instead of considering how to burrow the nanoprobes through her flesh, beneath the metal bracelets (which had been shockingly painful when she first attempted it), she had worn small holes in them instead.

Having done that, and brought the materials back inside to help manufacture more nanites without attacking her mineral components... There was still the question of what to do with her recovered ability.

There were, simply, too many individuals on the ship. They had already proven they could defeat Ten's Thirty -- and that was when One of Thirty had been leading them, and there had been _thirty_ of them.

Resistance to the Borg had not been futile this time. It had been effective. The Collective's shared consensus, of a truth classed as immutable as the gravity that held planets to their orbits, had been _wrong_.

No one on the ship had been adapted to serve the Collective, becoming one with the Borg, though some had been damaged beyond survival. Instead, the individuals on the ship had adapted Ten to separate her from the Collective.

No one had been fully assimilated. She supposed she could think _Yet_ , considering that she believed she would be able to initiate the process on at least _one_ person, if they did not notice her bracelets had been compromised. But she was aware that there were cameras that watched the room; it was doubtful she could successfully assimilate anyone. Even requesting the tribble be returned to her -- Ry'var brought it occasionally anyway -- would be unlikely to result in anything useful. They had already proven they could separate drones with their transporters.

The great truths of her existence were _wrong_.

Her Thirty, the minds closest to hers in the Collective, were _gone_.

And her emotions, once suppressed by the modifications and will of the Collective, raged like Twelve so-often had.

The Collective had been wrong. The Collective lacked her Thirty. Even if she could return to it, even if she were assigned to a new group... The Collective could not restore her Thirty to her. And thus the Collective, hissed that angry part of her that burned in her abdomen, _was irrelevant_.

That this left her very small and very much alone was also irrelevant.

So when Ry'var entered the cell, Ten did not raise an arm and bid her prepare for assimilation. When Ry'var approached, bearing a pad, Ten did not attempt to seize some part of the individual and extend her nanoprobes through the bracelet-holes. When Ry'var crouched down beside her, Ten merely looked at her and vaguely wished the individual had brought the tribble, in case some relevancy might yet appear if she interacted with the thing.

Ry'var offered her the pad. Ten took it and considered whether assimilating _it_ would be permitted. She quickly came to the conclusion of _probably not_ , and looked at the image on it instead.

"Species 3783," she said, and didn't let herself think of Thirteen, or Twenty-seven and Twenty-eight.

"The Federation calls them Romulans. They call themselves Rihanh, or Rihannsu." Ry'var reached out and slid the image to the side.

"Species 3259," Ten said, and didn't let herself think of Eleven, or Thirty.

"Not actually," Ry'var corrected. "There are a minority of Romulans who look like Vulcans, externally. And, well, after the Borg have gotten through with one of those, there's really no way to tell from the internal structures, either."

"The species are similar enough; such distinctions are irrelevant," Ten said.

"Not when we're trying to send you home."

_Home._ There were so many things she could have said to that. Home was the halls of the cube, that she had walked since removal from the maturation tank. Home was her regeneration cubical, with Nine and Eleven to either side of her.

Home was gone forever.

"This unit has no home," she said.

Ry'var said, quietly, "People can lose their homes. People... can make new homes. With new people. It's not the same, but sometimes it can still be good. A lot of the time it can be good. When I joined the ship, I knew I'd be leaving my family behind for months at a time. Maybe years. But even though everyone here was a stranger to me when I arrived... I have friends now. And I really like my friends here. I would be sad to have never known them." She put a hand on Ten's shoulder. "You don't have to stay alone. You can have friends without assimilating them. You can talk to people instead of forcing their minds to be like yours. You could help people..."

"Here?" Ten asked. There seemed no one in need of the training the Collective had placed in her, to save drones that might once have been discarded when functionality dropped below certain amounts.

"We've heard there's a planet that could use help. Farming and building, Commander Malem said."

"Malem?"

Ry'var slid the image to another. "That's from the viewscreen when he contacted us. We were asking a trader if they'd seen anyone who looked like you, in case maybe they knew your family."

Ten considered. "This drone is species 3783?"

"That's what our doctor finally decided. I mean, I suppose it's possible you've got ancestors from both sides -- both species, that is. Like I said, it's hard to tell sometimes. Even your genes have Borg alterations, the doctor says."

Ten slid the pictures back and forth with her fingertips, rather than by interfacing with the pad. "What did Malem say about family?"

"That he didn't know anyone who looked like you, but the planet could use help. The Romulans... Well, a lot of the colony worlds didn't do so well, what with their homeworld being destroyed in a natural disaster, and then civil wars." Ry'var wrapped her tail around one wrist. "We don't want to give you to one of the worlds where people are... still very ambitious. They might want to use you as a weapon. Or... something that wouldn't be good for you. But you deserve to be with your people. There's only so much I can teach you."

_People. Family._ Words, concepts that came to her in a half-dozen different languages, some with nuances, and some entirely parallel.

The Collective deemed those concepts irrelevant.

She deemed a Thirty-less Collective irrelevant.

"My people are Borg," she said. "My family is dead."

Ry'var drew in her breath and was silent.

Ten held the pad in both hands, and extended her nanoprobes through the holes in the bracelets, interfacing with the pad and draining it of the information within. Images, mostly of _Rihanh_. An entire dictionary that she spooled into internal memory storage, ruthlessly discarding recordings of the energy patterns in her cell. Entries marked _encyclopedia_ and _culture_ and _history_ followed, and she prioritized the creation of new memory storage, to lie flat against the bones, in order to retain the information even if she wished to make new recordings in the future.

When the pad was drained, she retracted her probes and offered it back to Ry'var.

For a moment, the individual didn't take it. "You got past the bracelets," she said, needlessly.

"Assimilation," Ten said, "is irrelevant. It will not restore my Thirty."

Now Ry'var took the pad back. "The people we care about can never really be replaced when they're gone. We can remember them, keep them in our hearts and minds, and we can learn to care about new people... but we can't replace our loved ones, no. And sometimes it gets easier, but we still miss them."

The individual probably didn't understand what it was, to miss the other twenty-nine parts of her mind, that had made her complete. That left her a fraction, a single unit divided by zero. Multiplied by zero. Left without purpose or guidance.

"This unit..." Ten frowned. "I. Do not have medical information about Rihanh. About Rihannsu who are not assimilated."

"I'll get you what we have," Ry'var said. "You're willing to go?"

"This ship does not need... me," Ten said. "This ship has many. A... colony. Needs me."

"So he says." Ry'var set the pad down and wrapped her tail around her waist. "Though we don't really know much about him, so I think we should also have some lessons about _boundaries_. And when it's perhaps reasonable to... shut someone down, even if you don't assimilate them. Not that you'd _want_ to assimilate someone who tried something like that. Ew." She laid her ears back and stuck out her tongue a little.

"Like what?"

"Well... The doctor says she put back enough that you could have children someday if you wanted. So I guess I need to have what humans call 'the Talk'."

Individuals already talked a lot, if Ry'var was an example of the type. Still, Ten listened, and occasionally remarked on the inefficiencies of it all, which were irrelevant comments -- but made her feel the smallest amount better.


	20. "Ten of Thirty?"

Two weeks later, Ry'var prepared to say goodbye to another Borg child. This time, she had Rico and Janiver with her, since S'saik was probably not a politic choice. Commander Malem had come aboard the _Gracie_ \-- both because it was (he said) a once in a lifetime opportunity for him to see a Federation ship without someone being on fire, and (he also said) so they could get a sense of his honor before he took charge of a very young girl. Tuskany had shaken his hand, apparently decided they would both be too on-guard around each other to get an impression of the Romulan's real personality, and left him to be evaluated by Ry'var.

Before they collected Ten, Ry'var made sure to drop hints that selling her to slavers, or similar offenses, would be unsafe. Malem, for his part, had replied bluntly, _"There are too few of us for such acts."_ And Ry'var had to admit he seemed one of the sort of Romulans who kept his word.

Not that you could ever truly tell with Romulans, or so the prejudices went. But Ten seemed to need a purpose, so...

When they got to the brig (with Eight and Fourteen's cells carefully opaque and soundproofed), they dropped the screen on Ten's cell. She stood, wearing only the gray minidress they'd gotten onto her after she'd had her internal organs put back; the useless bracelets had been removed and not replaced. Ry'var was struck by how tiny she seemed, with her barely-fuzzed, scarred head and bare feet. (Borg did not see the point of shoes, though Ry'var had insisted on packing some sandals for her, and a few undergarments, along with the power-conversion cables for recharging. The suitcase was waiting in the transporter room.)

Malem stopped at the edge of the cell. "Ten of Thirty?"

She nodded. "Commander Malem. This drone was... I was given an image of you."

(Ry'var noted that she was speaking Romulan now, rather than human, or Borg, or Vulcan, or Klingon. She thought of the unconscious Sixteen, and wondered if Ten could speak Andorian as well.)

"They say you're one of us. And the colony -- did they tell you about it? I'm the Maiori there."

The universal translator in Ry'var's ear stuttered on the concept, before settling on _leader._ Ten seemed unfazed, which was her usual state when she wasn't grieving. "I have medical programming. Farming does not seem difficult to learn."

Malem chuckled. "Harder than it looks sometimes, but it'd be good to have another medic around, too." He held out a hand. "Will you join us in making a new life for ourselves, _ke'rhin_?"

That translated, a breath later, as _kinswoman_.

Ten hesitated, then moved her focus from Malem's face to his hand, lifted her own... and placed it in his. For a tiny, terrified instant, Ry'var wondered if those nanoprobe cables would snake out of Ten's wrist and embed themselves into the Romulan commander's flesh, causing a dreadful situation to unfold when his ship got wind of it... But no. Ten said, direly serious, "This drone will... I will serve the colony."

(Later, when Ry'var related the scene to Theres, he said, "You can take a Borg out of the cube, but you can't get the cube... No, wait, that isn't parallel at all.")

"No assimilating?" Malem said, tucking her arm into his as he half-turned and drew her out of the cell.

"Assimilation without permission is impolite," Ten said, perfectly deadpan. "Consent must be obtained. Consent must be un-coerced. Consent should be enthusiastic or at least content."

Ry'var did not drop her face into her hands, or wring her tail, or do anything except keep her ears up and eyes wide like an innocent youngling. Rico snorted. Malem said, "Wise words," in the tone of someone wondering what people were teaching youngsters these days.

In the transporter room, after Ry'var gave her a little hug and handed her the suitcase of clothing, it was Rico who stepped forward and said, "Hey, kid. Good luck. You... you did good. Don't forget that, okay?"

She gave him a perplexed look, said, "Recording to permanent storage," and let Malem lead her onto the transporter pad.

The glitter took them away, and it was all Ry'var could do not to start bawling like an infant.

Rico sighed as well. "At least we've got the humans left, right? And that poor Andorian."

Wringing her tail, Ry'var nodded. "I'm sure they'll keep me busy all the way back to Earth."

***

_On the grounds of Starfleet Academy, a red-haired woman walked along a path. She was human, with shining black sensor-orbs instead of eyes, that marked her as a Borg -- and the clothing that marked her as a graduating cadet._

_One of her classmates waved. "Eight, you're nearly late!"_

_"I had to tell my sister good luck for her next test," Eight of Thirty protested cheerfully._

_"Do Borg even **need** luck?"_

_That had been what Fourteen had said, roughly. (Specifically, it had been, "Luck is irrelevant to tests.") Eight shrugged. "Can't hurt?"_

_"Yeah, well, come on, everyone's waiting for you! It's the big day today, after all! Ship-duty, here we come!"_

_"I wonder if we'll be able to capture a sphere..." Eight mused, and let herself be dragged along in her friend and classmate's wake._


	21. URLs and Research Notes

http://en.memory-alpha.wikia.com/wiki/Borg_species_designations  
http://www.rihan.org/drupal/dictionary/r  
http://sto.gamepedia.com/Malem

(Also the sto.gamepedia.com entry for Gasko Station, Memory-Beta's entries on Andorians, and probably some other links I closed before recording.)

Note that "Theres" is apparently a relatively common Andorian name in STO, as there are at least two colonist duty officers with that first name: Theres Ysari and Theres Eshidi. This Theres is using the last name prefix suggested by the memory-beta Andorian entry (where it designates which of the four sexes the bearer is), and the rest of the name is modified from STO colonist Sassa T'vaph's; not like there aren't Andorian colonists with both Eshidi and Eshiti names, according to my notes. (...you don't want to know how many colonist names and stats I've recorded before giving them Medical Supplies and Provisions and shipping them off again. @_@)


End file.
